by Edith Layton
“Meaning,” his host said in an ugly, threatening voice, “that I am no longer acceptable?”
The vicar made no reply, but with an ironic smile, only spread his two thin hands out to either side of his body in a gesture of total helplessness.
“Damn it, it’s all lies!” Sir Sidney shouted, banging his hand down upon the heavy wooden tabletop so hard that the plates and teacups danced.
“As you say,” the vicar replied imperturbably.
“Vicar,” Sir Sidney said suddenly, “you can do me a service before you leave.”
As his guest looked up warily from the spreading stain of tea upon the tablecloth that he had been observing, Sir Sidney heaved a bitter chuckle before he went on to say, “Aye, you’ve convinced me farther protests of innocence will be disregarded. But as a man of the world, you know as well as I do that if I manage to retrieve my good name, all will be forgiven, so I hardly need to blather on about it now, before I’ve got the facts in hand. But there’s a thing you can do for me to achieve those ends, for all our old time’s sake.”
The vicar regarded his host with a stilled and watchful expression as Sir Sidney said harshly, “You needn’t look at me like that, vicar, I’m not about to ask you to commit murder. It’s only gossip I’m after. It’s a little thing that I’ve had to make big because of your own decision to leave. It’s the sort of thing I’d have asked you over a hand of cards, by the way, if I had my choice.”
“Ah well, then,” the vicar asked in his usual amused accents, “then out with it, Ollie, if it’s who’s been sleeping in my bed, I’m sure to know.”
“Not precisely,” Sir Sidney said, leaning in closer to his guest. “His bedtime habits don’t interest me much, unless they’re spectacular. I’d like to know what you know of Lord Nicholas Daventry, Baron Stafford.”
“Ah,” said the vicar.
She looked uncommonly well in her new frock, Nicholas thought. And so he told her, before she left to go on another shopping expedition that he had ordered, or, he thought ruefully, on another sightseeing expedition as she preferred. For though she had colored up nicely at his compliment, and seemed to be all acquiescence as he told her to go ahead and purchase some more finery for herself, even as he did so he had the distinct notion that she had passed some sort of unspoken orders to her maidservant. She might yet, he thought with real amusement, dash into some shop and hurriedly buy a pair of gloves so as to comply with the letter of his command, and then pass the remainder of the day goggling at works of art in some museum to comply with the spirit of her own desires.
He smiled to himself at the thought of her possible furtive activity. Then realizing that he often smiled when he thought of her, he frowned. For she was a beauty, and a fellow ought to be moved to more explicable passions when he refined upon such a magnificent female face and form. Yet though there was no doubt that she could spur the expected emotions when he encountered her, it was not unusual to find that it was laughter which she provoked in him as often as it was lust. And laughter was a powerful aphrodisiac. At least, he discovered much to his own discomfort that it was apparently so in his own case.
He ought, at the very least, to mistrust her. At the very most, with Robin’s damning letters as his guide, he should detest her. But he had spent much time in her company during their journey to Paris and had dined with her each evening since. And as time went on, he found to his dismay that he enjoyed her company enormously. He appreciated her looks and enjoyed her conversation. But he discovered himself pondering too often about the question of her innocence, and musing far too long on the eventual outcome to their journeying.
It was not simply because she was a joy to look upon. There were, he had found, a great many deliciously lovely females in the world. Her hair might be likened to sun on spun gold, but what of it? He had seen, as well as run his fingers appreciatively through, tresses that could be compared to moonlight, starlight, and candlelight on a variety of poetic substances. Her eyes were clear and light blue and ringed with lustrous lashes. But he had gazed into orbs clear and green, and bright and brown, and shining and black, in fact, female eyes of a whole spectrum of dazzling colors had returned his interested stares with interest. And if now that she had worn her new gowns he could see her form was both straight and curving, slender and full, ripe and boyish all at once in that splendidly contradictive way of well-turned womanflesh, why then he had held and admired many such forms, many sweet times. He was, after all, and always had been, a connoisseur of her sex.
But never had he met a female who had all her virtues at once. And who was able, as well, to always make him laugh, and to always know why he laughed, and who would laugh herself with him at the delight of it.
He wanted her. That was plain, and that was regrettable. If she were the witch Robin had painted her, then he would turn from her forever and she would pay dearly for her dual deception. But if she had been honest, and even then Robin did not want her, and she did not want him, as she had said ... Lord Nicholas Daventry, Baron Stafford, realizing the direction that his thoughts were leading him, attempted to cut them off ruthlessly. His plans for a future mistress, he told himself sharply, were more than merely premature, they would be stillborn if he did not pay attention to the immediate task before him. He tried to concentrate instead solely upon the direction in which his feet were presently leading him. For the Baron Stafford was on his way to yet another appointment with yet another social lion who might know where his errant nephew might be.
There should be no difficulty in finding traces of Robin’s trail, Nicholas thought irritably, wondering at his singular lack of success as yet, for there was little doubt that he was in the best of positions for locating any soul on the face of the civilized planet from where he was right now. All of the focus of Europe, and all of its famed, were here in Paris at present. Wellington was here, Metternich was here, the King of Prussia, the Emperor of the Russias, the great of all the Continent were here in the beating heart of Paris, now that Napoleon himself was not. And while that would-be king of the world rode the seas aboard the English ship Bellerophon and gazed out over English waters to his closed and clouded future, Nicholas mused that perhaps Bonaparte, like any lesser cuckold, still dreamed of this, his beloved city even as she gave warm welcome to other men who loved her well.
For despite the fact that he had only been in Paris for a little over a week, the baron had already been to balls and galas and gambling hells and restaurants and operas, where he had seen the famous and their familiars disporting themselves. He had gone to all the festivities in a singularly unfestive frame of mind. It was never pleasure he sought, only information. But he was so skilled in amiability that there was no one who guessed at his mission as he went from waltz party to card party, from state dinner to intimate supper, from soiree to orgy, always amused and amusing, ever obliging, but always detached and watchful. He had heard a thousand rumors, but had acted on none, for they were all merely rumors and he sought confirmation.
Now he walked the streets of the notorious Palais Royal district and he nodded to several acquaintances remembered from London as he strode past houses and cafes that offered diverse amusement. There were a great many Englishmen here now, along with members of all the allied armies, and men of all nations could buy pastimes here. But the baron had no interest in any diversion that was for sale, he never had. He did not flatter himself that he received more invitations than other fellows from the smiling females who stood about in front of their shops, for he knew it was not his trim form which enticed them, but the expensive cut of his clothes upon it, and not his handsome face which they longed for him to lay on their pillows, but his equally handsome purse.
But for all the certainty in his hard-won wisdom he would have been greatly surprised to learn that many of the businesswomen he passed and smiled his regrets at would have been pleased in his case to have made a donation, rather than a sale. His first mistress had left him a legacy of caution, which he knew o
f. But she had also robbed him of his vanity, a theft that he had never discovered and which ironically was perhaps her greatest parting gift to him. It was that very lack of conceit which, unknown to himself, enhanced the carefully schooled charm he had been practicing since he had set sail from England. It had always made him remarkably successful, and this time it had been no different. Yet though a great many people had wanted to tell him his nephew’s whereabouts, and a great many had told him all sorts of stories about Robin, as he now walked through the streets of Paris he was dishearteningly aware that he was no closer to his nephew or the truth about him than he had been in his townhouse in London.
Nicholas paused for a moment to puzzle out a signpost above him. The original name seemed to have been scratched out a long time in the past, probably during the days of the Revolution, or so he guessed, so it must have been a saint’s or a king’s name that had been written there. A new name had obviously been given the street during the Emperor’s reign, but now that the wheel of fortune had turned once again, yet another name had been hastily scrawled atop that last one. As he attempted to puzzle out the latest designation for this street, which in itself embodied the history of a turbulent generation, he felt a hand placed lightly upon his sleeve.
“It is now ‘La Rue du Roi,’ ” a well-bred English voice said pleasantly, “but if you were looking for ‘La Rue de l’Empereur,’ Nick, it is also that.”
“Vicar! Good lord, sir, what brings you here?” Nicholas said in surprise, although more than surprise caused his usually cool white countenance to take on a warm and suffused darker glow.
“Don’t rate yourself, Nick,” the vicar said in amused tones, although a gratified and understanding smile appeared upon his thin lips. “It’s quite natural to call me Vicar, all my friends as well as my enemies do. I know you take particular care not to do so to spare my feelings, but rest easy, my lad, I choose the name, after all. It is a parody, of course. It may signify all sorts of wicked things to the world, to be sure, but as I embrace it, as well as the whole of my naughty history, I remove the sting and the stigma from it. Or so at least I think I. do. No matter. What brings me here, Nick? Why I have a friend here.”
“Then sir,” Nicholas said quickly, “I shouldn’t like to take you from him, but if I could have a few words with you? There’s a cafe a bit further up the street,” he added in a hopeful tone.
“No, not the café, for my poor lights and liver and whatever else abides within this wretched frame of mine won’t take another glass of good red wine, and it should pain me, lad, to watch others imbibing what I cannot. But we could walk on a space together, I think. And you needn’t worry about taking me from my friend, Nick, for you are he,” the vicar said, smiling as he took the baron’s arm, as if for support, as they continued along the street.
They seemed almost of a height, although they were actually of very disparate size. The vicar had been an extremely tall man in his youth, but it appeared that his age had diminished him so that he stood even a little less tall than the baron, and his slight frame increased his appearance of almost translucent frailty. Yet Nicholas noted that even as the elder man seemed to lean upon his arm, he bore no additional weight upon that limb and though the older gentleman gave every impression of fragility, there was nothing but strength apparent in his hand’s clasp. The vicar, the baron thought again, was never to be taken at face value, nor should he ever be underestimated, as it seemed he so often wished to be.
“I wanted a few words with you, Nick,” the vicar said as they strolled along the famous avenues, “but I wanted it to appear to be of little import and less note, so it is best that we just chat as we stroll on. I have just come from Sir Oliver Sidney’s establishment, where, as you know, I have been a guest forever. The fellow’s in the bucket, Nick, but that you know as well, for I believe you put him there yourself not a week past. No, no, please don’t insult me and yourself by denying it, I know what I know. And if you wish to know more, you will please allow me to know better. There’s no treason in saying nothing, is there lad?”
Wise to the vicar’s ways, Nicholas remained silent and felt the old man’s approval in a slight pressure being made upon his arm.
“Good, good,” the vicar said happily. “Now Nick, I left our Ollie in a somewhat precarious position. He’s lost his friends, his source of funds, and most likely his lovely lady as well, or at least he is bound to do so, perhaps even by the time we finish speaking. For she’s not, alas, the picture of constancy. Now Ollie has hopes to recover all. Unfortunately, he most likely means to go about it using the same methods that lost him all.”
The vicar delivered himself of a little sigh signifying profound regret, and then they both paused to acknowledge the salute of a rackety duke of their acquaintance. The vicar resumed speaking as the fellow passed, as though there had been no interruption at all, “And unhappily enough, Ollie seems to bear you some personal ill will. So, of course, before I left, as a sort of final payment for battening on his good offices for all these years, he asked me to tell him everything I knew about you.” And here the vicar paused.
But Nicholas kept on walking. He refused to miss a step and so said smoothly, merely the one word, “And?”
“Very good,” the vicar said. “Well, I told him all, of course.”
It took all of the baron’s control to continue walking as though nothing important had been said, and even more self-restraint than he knew he possessed to keep from flinging the vicar’s thin hand from his arm as he would throw off a venomous spider.
“I told him,” the vicar said obliviously, “about your liaison with Lady Davies, and your brief and secret connection with Gwen Lindsay, and your patronage of Mary Flowers, Julia Johnson, Lucille LaPoire, and that little filly from Madame Felice’s stables. I’m sorry, my boy, but I also told him about your fling with that shocking Turner woman.”
Nicholas felt the tension leave his shoulders and he found he could draw in his breath more easily. There hadn’t been a word about his errands for the crown, nor a syllable about his present search, only common gossip about common indiscretions. The vicar turned toward him slightly and gave him a smile that showed all of his small white teeth. Doubtless, the baron thought, the older man had felt the tension ease in his body as well. Perhaps that was why the old fox had held his arm so closely in the first place, so as to better gauge his involuntary reactions. It never would do to underestimate the vicar, he thought again.
“Yet,” the vicar went on musingly, “with all I divulged to him, Ollie was nonetheless unhappy with the information. And I don’t think it was that he was disappointed, as sad to relate, I always am, at your unswerving devotion to the female gender.” Seeing from a sly, sidewise glance that his comment had not fazed his young companion in the least, the vicar laughed softly and went on, “Not a quake to be felt. No, lad, that is why I never do underestimate you either. So he asked me about your companion on the trip, this mysterious Miss Foster, the poor girl with the aching head who never showed her nose outside her rooms save for that one night you met her in that little garden.”
But at that, the baron was taken aback for a moment, which caused the vicar to give him a sharp look before he said easily, “But I told him she was Nobody.
“In short, lad,” the vicar said, as he slowed their pace by hanging back a bit, “Ollie was after something to hold over you. But though it shames me to tell it, I could not come up with a thing to his purposes.”
At this, the vicar paused for long enough for the baron to understand that he might at last speak.
“And this inability to produce something sufficient to my ruin was due, I take it, to the exemplary life I lead?” he asked quietly.
“No, Nick,” the vicar said softly, “no man who breathes is immune to some scandal, past or present. Or at least, no one I’ve ever encountered in my interesting lifetime. Rake or prelate, I’ve never met a saint. But your sins are, on balance, not very grave ones, never the stuff of easy
blackmail, at any rate. I hear a great many things, lad, but I tell only a fraction of what I hear, and that always to a purpose. I know the identity of your sometime employers and I find I quite agree with their decision about Ollie. He was a very good host, and in his fashion a fair enough friend, but I always took care with what I told him. I suffered, you see, from the absurd notion that whatever I said to him ended up being translated into another language somewhere along the line.
“I have been and done a great many things, Nick,” the vicar said softly, “but what Ollie forgets is that whatever I have been, I have always been an Englishman.
“And it is for that reason that I tell you, Nick,” the vicar said with some urgency at last, “to find Robin. For he is not so impervious to scandal as you, and Ollie is seeking him, too. No, I said nothing of him, I did not have to. Ollie has ears as well. But our Sir Sidney is desperate, and he is not without resources. You may be able to escape any net that Ollie casts, but I tell you, the same is not the case with your nephew. Find young Robin before Ollie does, Nick, and before he is actually become the new marquess.”
“And as to his whereabouts?” the baron asked.
“That,” the vicar said sadly, “I cannot say with any accuracy. I believe him to be on his way to Paris. But then again, he may be tarrying in Belgium. I am sorry to be so unhelpful, I would enlighten you if I could. But even I have limits.” He smiled before he went on to say, “I can only urge you to make all haste to discover him.”
But now the baron fixed the older man with a steady stare and asked with great sincerity, “What is the truth about Robin, sir? Since you urge me to discover him quickly, I cannot help but think you know it as well as he himself does. And if you wish to aid me in any way, you know I would be forever in your debt if you could disclose the facts of his disappearance and his continued exile to me.”
“There are some things, believe it or not, that are not mine to tell,” the vicar said somberly. “Some tales which loyalty to my friends or honor due my country prevent me from divulging, so much,” he said with a twisted smile, “as I might love to have you in my debt, my boy.”